Sound Design

BA/BSc Sound Design - Level 5 - Journal

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I read a bit about recording to wax cylinders in Capturing Sound by Mark Katz. In short, musicians would play or sing into horns and the pitch and loudness of sounds would be engraved onto wax cylinders. The recording room needed to be around 40 degrees Celsius to make the wax soft enough for recording. Not only would musicians record in sweltering heat, they couldn't afford to make mistakes. Creating dynamics required engineers to physically position musicians in different places of the recording room. Guitars and strings were too quiet to record and the cylinders were only capable of recording 2-3 minutes of music and so many of the recordings produced in the early 1900's consisted mostly of brass and percussive instruments. Musicians began to compose songs of just 2 or 3 minutes in length, and this was the beginning of the 3 minute radio hit, a trend which continues even today  when we can record for a virtually unlimited amount of time. I always wondered what these wax cylinders sounded like, and thanks to Rob Scallion I now know! Fantastic idea Rob!

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Inspiration! Thanks mom! Xxx

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Visit Original Link

A chap called Howard Broomfield (1994) once argued that the rhythms and horns of jazz music were influenced by the steam trains that clattered along railroads with toots and whistles. The Ableton audio to midi converter seems to agree. I’ve recorded part of a train journey and converted the recording to midi using the rhythmic and melodic algorithms. The rhythms, tones and intensity of the recording are analysed and represented in midi. The rhythmic algorithm focuses on the kick drum, snare drum, and hi-hats of a traditional drum beat, so in order to introduce some variation to the rhythm I have moved some of the midi notes to include open hi-hats, tom drums, splashes and crashes. It is possible to use any percussive sound but it’s the rhythms of the train recording that dictate the beat. The same applies to the melodic and harmonic algorithms. I chose a piano instrument to get that traditional jazz feel, but I could have used any instrument. When I’m travelling in London my ears are very much aware of the complex sounds that occur from all directions and a multitude of frequencies. If I close my eyes I can begin to imagine orchestrating those sounds. I carry a handy recorder with me everywhere I go to capture as much interesting material as I can. Any of these sounds could inspire a great piece of music, or in the case of the Jazz Train, the field recordings will ‘dictate,’ or ‘conduct’ the music. I’m taking this approach with my portfolio material as part of my level 6 major project.

Schafer, R.M. (1994) Soundscapes: Our Sonic Environment and the Tuning of the World. Vermont: Destiny Books

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Reese bass from 1981 #Japan #Markkarn #davidsylvian #dnbmassive

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When you're spending hours looking at production software it can dampen the ability to liberate your imagination. So when it comes time to analyse my own work and draw inspiration to complete compositions I use #vlcplayer visualisations to get back into the dream world I intended to create in the first place. I will usually come up with a bunch of ways to make my music better when I do this. The farmer is cultivating fresh beats this year, it's going to be a good harvest! Here's to music, creativity and liberation of the mind! #rambles #newmusic #focused

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I have been composing music for a game that is currently under development by LSBU Games. The brief is happy music consisting of traditional/world instruments. My music theory knowledge is fairly slack and my keyboard skills are equally as poor. I've been producing electronic music for almost ten years and have never put enough time aside to learn music theory. One of my lecturers told me I should focus on my strengths in order to be more productive and develop my weaknesses over time. Although I lack music theory skills I do have good ears, and I have played guitar for 17 years, so it goes without saying it is certainly one of my strengths. So if I find myself struggling to write melodies on the keyboard I often plug my guitar in to my audio interface and write melodies or chord progressions on the guitar. This has helped to speed up my writing process, as the games developers need new musical ideas quickly, and frequently, with various different versions at different tempos and rhythms. Sometimes I will keep the guitar recordings and base my ideas on them, other times I will copy the melody on the keyboard, allowing me to swap instruments in the DAW and experiment with different sounds.

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Fourth World Vol.1: Possible Musics by Brian Eno and Jon Hassell

A deliberate oppression to the term world music. Brian Eno and Jon Hassel approached this album with the intention of creatingmusic that is mentally and geographically indeterminate. Eno and Hassell combined spiritual third world culture and tradition with first world technology to create a fourth world, an indistinguishable musical world. African percussionists are employed throughout the album, providing a pulse much like the ritualistic rhythms of traditional pygmy music found in third world regions. Hassell’s trumpet performance is processed with a harmoniser, resulting in a voice like sound and localised field recordings are employed to create dream-like soundscapes.

Jon Hassell continued on with the fourth world theme throughout his career and inspired an entire roster of artists including Arca and O Yuki Conjugate. In fact, contrary to his anti-genre beliefs, fourth world music has become a genre of its own. It’s an ethnographical approach to music which ignores specific traditions, merges localised cultures and morphs it all into a new world, a fourth world, but after listening to much of his material it becomes evident that there is a signature sound. Certain techniques are used to transform sounds into John Hassell-like sounds, resulting in something quite distinguishable.

Unlike corporate record labels who conjure up genres and scenes that they think will be most marketable at a given time, Hassel ignores trends and instead focuses on his own personal musical interests.

When I first drafted ideas for my EP, I’d not heard of John Hassel or the term fourth world music, but after researching interviews, reviews, and listening to his music I have been pleasantly surprised to read about his ideologies and his approach to composition. There are many similarities to that of my own.

References:

https://www.residentadvisor.net/features/2984

https://www.wired.com/1997/11/building-a-musical-fourth-world/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFig-OiIwDo&t=503s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40Zv7WWP_tA

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Voice improvisation performer Iris Garrelfs processes her vocal through Max/MSP, looping and pitch shifting live vocal recordings to create these cacophonies of voice. She produces some fantastically haunting pieces, and it’s a joy to watch her seemingly lose herself creating breathy, gurgly, grunty, screechy noises. Sometimes she sounds like a choir, sometimes male, sometimes animal, sometimes cyborg, but always unique.

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I found this whilst researching vocal manipulation. This piece is formed entirely of vocal from Katie Gately who uses Melodyne software to manipulate her voice.

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Vocal Manipulation

The voice as an instrument. Vocal manipulation is a process which has developed alongside the technology which allows it. Though the process of recording vocal and treating it in post production is in effect vocal manipulation, in recent years it has become popular to manipulate the voice further to transform or extinguish gender, to alienate, or to be used as though it were a synthesiser. Many of my favourite artists have used these techniques to create unique identities within their music, of which we sympathise with as human, because it is a human voice, yet it’s not the human voice as we know it.

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Borrowed Music

“It’s OK to steal other people’s ideas“ - I’ve read or heard this from a number of musicians. The human musical Wikipedia that is Howard Goodall says it in How Music Works, and goes on to name a number of artists who have taken ideas from one piece of music, and made it their own. It seems like a crazy idea when for more than ten years I’ve been trying to make music which is “different.” When bands are starting out it’s usually common practice to be as original and unique as possible, to stand out from the rest. Apparently this isn’t always necessary.

The first season of a television series based on Neil Gaiman’s American God’s was released recently featuring music by Brian Reitzell, who’s music hops from genre to genre. Brian has composed theme music for each of the main characters in the series based on their origin, their energy, and their storyline - but instead of composing mysterious sounding melodies for a mysterious character, or dark and sinister melodies for an evil character, Brian associates each character with a genre, or specific artist. In one scene Gillian Anderson’s character is dressed as David Bowie, and so Brian composed a song very similar to a David Bowie song - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3ElU0RPabo - another example is a song called “Tehran 1979″ which sounds like 1980′s Blondie. Of course Brian employs Debbie Harry to sing on the track confirming his influence - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WreUmBorEmA

Another recent television series called Westworld features three Radiohead songs reinterpreted, and a song by Soundgarden, again reinterpreted.

Bruno Mars, Will Smith, Stevie Wonder, DJ Shadow, Dr.Dre, the list goes on. People borrow music all the time, but why? Why do we need to remake music? To celebrate its brilliance? Why not create new music? 

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I thoroughly enjoyed working on this mini-documentary for a level 4 collaborative project with a group of photography and digital design students. It focuses on regeneration in SE1, London. We carried out interviews with local traders, construction workers, estate agents and a vicar, to learn about the effects of regeneration from varying perspectives. I edited the interview footage to create a montage of contrasting views to a visual back drop of the SE1 area. Percussive elements were extracted from the field recordings I carried out in the area, and from inevitable background noise which was captured when recording interviews. Interviewing the vicar in a church surrounded by three separate redevelopment sites was not easy, but it indicates the amount of disruption associated with regeneration projects, as is expressed by the vicar and other interviewees.

Our main inspiration for this project was a film called Blight by John Smith in collaboration with music composer Jocelyn Pook.

Awareness for social impact is something I feel quite strongly about, and would like to work on more projects like this.

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General Thoughts - BA/BSc Sound Design - Level 5 - Week 1

This is the end of the first week of my final year studying Sound Design. I’ve done a lot of thinking, a little reading, and some brainstorming - but I’m still unsure as to my main focus for my research project and my major project.

My career goals span a range of roles which are mostly centred around music composition and production. In writing music I tend not to stick to specific genres or sounds, so naturally over the past couple of years studying Sound Design I’ve been drawn to music composition for licensing and synchronisation opportunities, art installations and film. Although this type of work is often client based, a few artists in this field have described it as giving them much more creative freedom, as opposed to working with bands, or for record companies. Creative freedom is an appealing concept!